A US Navy spokesman stressed Washington’s position that United States freedom of navigation operations were meant to “protect the rights, freedoms, and lawful uses of the sea and airspace guaranteed to all nations under worldwide law”. Then, over Chinese objections, an worldwide tribunal ruled it had jurisdiction in a case brought by the Philippines on maritime claims.
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However, after the Philippine case was filed before the tribunal in The Hague in January 2013, China boycotted the proceedings. It will hear seven of Manila’s submissions. Instead, it says it wants to agree a code of conduct to manage relations in the South China Sea with its South East Asian neighbours, but talks on that have yet to yield any fruit. “Similarly, conscious that in 2006 China made a declaration, in accordance with the Convention, to exclude maritime boundary delimitations from its acceptance of compulsory dispute settlement procedures under the Convention, the Philippines has stated that it is not asking this Tribunal to delimit any maritime boundaries”.
“China has constantly asked for evidence showing how it is affecting navigation security in the South China Sea”.
The ROC moved its seat of government to Taipei after Nationalist forces led by Chiang Kai-shek (蔣介石) were defeated by the Chinese communists in the Chinese Civil War in 1949.
The operations chiefs of the Chinese and U.S. navies held an hour-long tele-video conference on Thursday, during which Chinese Admiral Wu Shengli warned a minor incident could spark a war in the South China Sea.
To try to substantiate this, the United States patrol also passed through areas claimed by Hanoi and Manila, but as Washington has been distinctly quiet over the island-building activities of other countries, which pre-dated China’s, it is clear the Americans are only really bothered by the Chinese.
But China was quick to declare that it would not abide by the ruling.
On a brief trip to the heavily mined area that for 60 years has been a buffer between the two Koreas, Mr Carter and South Korean Defence Minister Han Min Koo stood atop a hill known as Observation Post Ouellette – the closest post to the demarcation line between the two nations.
The court’s rulings are binding, although it has no power to enforce them and countries have ignored them in the past.
“The Chinese government will resolutely safeguard territorial sovereignty and legal sea interests, and China will do whatever necessary to oppose deliberate provocation from any country”, Zhang added.
UNCLOS does not rule on sovereignty but it does outline a system of territory and economic zones that can be claimed from features such as islands, rocks and reefs.
With the USA, recently, sending a warship to the troubled waters, China came under tremendous pressure over its control in the South China Sea.
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Meanwhile, although the United States has no intentions of claims over the disputed area in the South China Sea, but its sea and air assets sail and flies near China’s reclaimed islands. No date has been set for the next hearings.
